


Into Words (Or You Are In Love)

by alrightginger



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe, Darling Petals, F/M, jily
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-01
Updated: 2018-09-01
Packaged: 2019-07-05 05:26:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,448
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15857130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alrightginger/pseuds/alrightginger
Summary: Lily Evans doesn’t believe in love. At least, not for herself. It’s something as silly as believing Peter Pan, fairy tales, or magic. And then one day, a wizard by the name of James Potter saves her life, and Lily isn’t sure what she believes in anymore.





	Into Words (Or You Are In Love)

**Author's Note:**

> This is for darling Petals birthday. I hope you like it though it turned out completely different than I had originally planned. Some of the lyrics are out of order to better fit the scene selections. Please leave a comment!

**Into Words**

**(Or You Are In Love)**

_No proof, not much, but you saw enough..._

Lily Evans isn't entirely sure that she believes in love.

At least, not love for  _her._

Not really. Not truly.

She knows that the feeling, the action, the very  _being_  of it exists for other people.

The proof is in the numerous books that she keeps well stocked in her small coffee and bookshop,  _Coffee and Characters._ She's seen Marlene's eyes shine with the emotion on her wedding day as she stood next to her. Her parents got by for nearly forty years solely on love.

But it never seems to happen for her.

There is no spotting of a bloke in a dark room and feeling her heart beat wildly. No  _coming of age_ young adult romance in her teens, like the ones in her favorite books.

She suspects, that if it were even  _possible_  for her to fall in love, it would have happened with her old Uni boyfriend, Robert Hodge.

He had all the makings of a boy one would fall in love with. Though there wasn't any sort of heart stopping moment when she met him. In fact, it took her several glances to even notice him, and it wasn't until he had written his number on the coffee cup she purchased at their Uni coffee shop where he worked did she manage to actually  _look_ at him. He wasn't striking enough to really have noticed if he didn't put forth the effort for Lily to see him. But upon deeper inspection he was rather handsome in his own clever, ambitious, walking an impossibly straight line sort of way.

But when he kissed her, instead of feeling like she had been breathless the moment his lips touched hers, she rather found herself  _holding_ her breath and counting the seconds, waiting for it to be over. As though she didn't want to waste her own breath on kissing him. As if she didn't have enough air in her lungs to reciprocate the action. He didn't part his lips, didn't move them against hers, and Lily was left suspecting that she quite knew what it was like to kiss a brick wall.

No, love isn't something that Lily suspects she will ever find herself in.

To Lily Evans, it is something as silly as believing fairy tales, Peter Pan,  _or magic._

But all that is about to change on a Tuesday afternoon with the simple act of crossing the street with her nose in a book.

* * *

_Time moved too fast, you played it back..._

James honestly hadn't  _meant_ to do it.

Well, saving a pretty redheaded girl with her nose stuck in a book from being flattened by a car as she crossed the street -  _that_ he meant to do.

_Accio-ing_ her straight out of the road and into his arms -  _that_ had been a complete reflex.

One he hadn't even realized he had done until the girl is twisting in his arms and screaming.

"I'm sorry!" he cries, releasing her as though she has caused him to catch fire and clutching at his locks - his wand  _still_ in his hand. "I mean - I'm not sorry for saving you- "

"How - how -" The girl is gaping at him. Opening her mouth and closing it as though she had used all of her remaining breath to scream just moments ago. Her eyes dart wildly between his face and the wand in his hand. " _How in the world?"_

And here is where James is completely and utterly  _fucked,_ because not only is this girl  _gorgeous,_ but James can clearly tell by the way her eyes are studying the wand in his hand that she's  _clever._

Which is a complete shame, because it isn't everyday that he meets gorgeous, clever girls.

Isn't everyday that he gets to  _rescue_ gorgeous, clever girls in a rather chivalrous way.

And it really is a pity because now he is going to have to erase her memory of ever meeting him.

It's the law. A rather stupid law, according to his mother who likes to think that muggles wouldn't absolutely go mad if they coexisted, though this particular girl in his arms might make his mother rethink her stance.

But there's a moment of hesitancy that comes when his hazel eyes lock with her emerald and James, who is never one for second guessing, finds himself momentarily frozen in time.

And  _really,_ James thinks to himself, isn't he normally one to not care whether or not a rule gets broken or bent?

He's gone the whole of his life twisting the rules around his finger, and this girl looks worth a bit of reckless behavior.

But unfortunately for him, she takes the half smirk blossoming on face, and the tightening of his hand around wand in deep thoughtful to mean something else entirely.

And she takes the book she's clutching tightly and wallops him over the head with it.

" _What the hell!"_

" _Get away from me!"_ she shrieks, striking him again, this time hitting him across the jaw.

" _Hey!_ Watch it! I'm quite proud of that part of my body!" He's rubbing the side of his jaw, which he's certain is going to sprout a nice looking bruise. "Is this the thanks I get for saving your life?"

"Is  _that_ what you think you've just done?" She moves to smack him again, but James is quicker this time, grabbing her book by the spine and wrestling it from her grip. " _Give that back!"_

She's a bit less threatening without her book that she wields like a sword, but just a bit. And James thinks that it's rather a pity that she's  _not_ a witch with the way her words get spat right at him with perfect pronunciation and force behind them. She would be absolutely wicked with a wand.

"What is this anyway?" He opens the book, ignoring her. It's an older book, one he's never seen before, and when he flips through the pages it reminds him of his childhood library at his parents house.

"It's  _Emma!"_

" _Emma?_ You named your book?"

"What do you -  _it's the title you nitwit!_ Look at the cover!"

He barely has time to glance at the cover sporting a woman with a rather long neck and dark hair which does indeed say Emma when the book is snatched from him. The girl clutches the book to her chest, letting out a huffy breath as she looks him once over. He stares right back. Eyes crinkled from his nearly too wide smile, head cocked ever so slightly.

And she looks like she wants to smack him overtop of the head again.

He might let her, he suspects.

"You saved my life," she says after a moment passes between them. It's not a question. She doesn't look like the type to question many things. James thinks he would like to change that.

"I did."

"With - with  _that,"_ she says, pointing to his wand almost accusingly. "What  _is_ that?"

"It's a wand," he says as though it's the most obvious thing in the world. As though to her it doesn't look like a simple stick.

" _A wand?"_

"Yes."

"Like - like the ones out of those children's books?"

"I suppose so? Though mine came from Ollivander's."

"Ollivander's?"

He's telling her too much but he just can't seem to stop. "The wand shop."

"So, let me get this straight," she says. "You're - some sort of - of  _warlock -"_

"We prefer the term  _wizard_ actually."

"Whatever -  _wizard._ I was crossing the street, not paying attention apparently, and you use your - your  _magic..._ is that the right term?"

James smirks. "Yes, that is the correct term."

"You use your magic and levitate me out of the road to avoid being flattened like a pancake."

"Apparently so," he says, not even bothering to keep the amusement from his voice. "Well done."

She's logical and orderly and he thinks he can see her trying to piece together the oddity of it all in her eyes, though he suspects she's unable to come to any sort of conclusion.

"So," she says, taking a deep breath, "now what?"

"What do you mean?"

"What happens now? I've never been saved by a - a wizard before. I don't know what the right protocol is afterwards."

"I believe," he starts, taking a step closer to her and feeling a bit braver when she doesn't back away, "that the right sort of protocol for this situation is to exchange  _names_ with one another."

She seemingly relaxes though there still isn't the trace of a smile across her features, but James is smiling enough for the both of them.

"Alright then," she says, extending a single hand towards him. "I'm Lily. Lily Evans."

He takes her hand, swearing he feels the jolt of something through his veins as he does so. Her eyes are on their clasped hands rather than his face, and the way her mouth is slightly parted, he knows she felt it too.

"James Potter, at your service."

* * *

_Small talk, he drives, coffee at midnight…_

A week passes and Lily nearly wonders if, perhaps, she merely imagined meeting a strange wizard that saved her life.

She hasn't told a single person about the  _incident,_ as she's prone to call it inside her own head now. After all, who in their right mind would believe her? She herself doesn't fully believe it, and is torn somewhere between obsessing over the wizard named James Potter who seemingly disappeared into thin air after shaking her hand, and trying to forget the whole damn thing.

But it's when she's locking up her shop at nearly midnight,and sweeping up after some particularly messy customers that she is forced to walk the thin line of insanity that she's been treading for nearly a week.

For James Potter has just appeared, and it's not the ringing of the bell from her locked door that alerts her, but rather, the fact that he's seemingly appeared out of thin air  _again_  with a  _crack_ similarly to a gunshot.

" _Jesus Christ!"_ she shrieks, taking a swing at him with her broom which he catches easily. " _Stop doing that!"_

"'Lo, Evans," he says, taking the broom from her and inspecting it with careful hands as though it's something precious. "What model is this?"

" _What?"_

"The broom," he says simply, raising a single eyebrow in a way she absolutely cannot do. "What's the year and make?"

"How on earth am I supposed to know that?" she huffs. "It's a  _broom,_ not a car _."_

"Muggles don't put much stock in their broom designs?"

" _No."_  She knows she's being rather rude, but the bloke has just appeared out of nowhere  _again_ and she's too exhausted from a long day to entertain wizards.

"Interesting," he says, and she can tell he means it. His hands slide over the handle once more. "Pity. This one's got nice woodwork too."

"It was my mother's," she says without thinking, and a sudden sadness hits her over something as silly as a  _broom_ and she changes the subject. "What are you doing here anyway?  _How_ are you here?"

"I wanted to make sure you were okay, and I did some... _research_ and found out you worked here."

" _Research?_ You mean you  _stalked_  me."

"Is it  _really_ stalking though? I'd like to think it's a bit more romantic than that."

"Yes, it absolutely  _is_ stalking," she says.

"Eh, well that's a shame. Anyway, to answer your other question, I apparated here," he says honestly as though Lily is supposed to know what that even  _means_. "And I also wanted to make sure that you haven't...  _told_ anyone."

"Have I told anyone that a mysterious wizard man saved my arse and then suddenly disappeared into thin air and then  _reappeared_  out of thinner air?  _No,_ I can't say I have. I'd probably be sent off to the loony ward."

"Good, good."

He's smirking and she feels a sudden swelling in her chest. As though the smirk is pulling at her heart, threatening to rip it out of her rib cage.

And she frowns.

"What would happen if - if I  _did_ tell someone?"

He looks suddenly serious, and Lily thinks that perhaps it's something that has truly been bothering him.

"Technically, I wasn't supposed to let you walk away that day... _remembering_ anything."

Lily pauses for a moment, taking in his words and the meaning behind them.

"And," she says so softly that she's surprised that he can hear her, "why  _did_ you let me walk away... _remembering_ you?"

"It just didn't seem like a place I wanted to be in your mind," he shrugs. "A lost memory and all that."

Lily thinks for a moment about the possibility of  _not_ spending a week obsessing over James Potter and his magic. About not even remembering him, about not remembering the way it felt to be nearly flying and then caught by him. And she decides she would much rather being constantly teetering the brink of insanity for the thought of him than not.

He's still clutching the broom when her mind returns from the memory of a week ago, and she thinks she can almost see him a bit clearer now.

"Would you like some coffee?" she asks. "I know it's past midnight, but there's literally no better time for coffee than after midnight."

He smiles at her.

And this time she returns it.

* * *

_No proof, one touch, you felt enough…_

Another week passes. A week of hot summer nights, his own aching heart, and days filled with thoughts of Lily Evans.

He hasn't been able to stop thinking of her since that day that he saved her. He can't get the feeling of the way his fingertips grazing the bare skin of her hand out of his mind, the shock coursing through him because of it, and what it could possibly mean.

He knows he really ought to stay away, that he never should have shown up in her shop in the first place that night, that there are too many reasons that a muggle like her shouldn't be involved with a wizard like him.

But he can't stop thinking about her.

He's afraid if he doesn't see her he won't be able to see the red of her hair with his eyes closed so tight at the end of the day, or remember the way her voice sounds when she's frustrated with him. Or when she's gentle with him, offering him a warm, bitter drink he's never had before.

James feels as though he's positively tangled up in the thought of her, and he knows he's a bit more than pathetic for it.

But he can't seem to stop himself from crawling out of his bedroom window that night, his own broom in hand.

_You keep his shirt, he keeps his word, and for once you let go…_

Lily's logic is failing her when it comes to James Potter, and she begins to suspect that he's not something she  _can_ approach logically.

He makes no damn sense. But more than that, more than the insanities and eccentricities that make up James, her feelings are becoming muddled and illogical when it comes to him.

Which is why she's taken out her old  _Peter Pan_ novel in hopes that it would somehow explain him a bit further.

It's a bit mad, she thinks, but so is  _he_. James that is. And in turn Peter Pan who Lily is lead to believe is basically the same person as the mysterious wizard that saved her life two weeks ago.

The one who shows up at random and disappears at seemingly even  _more_ random times. Like in the middle of a handshake, or with her back turned to refill her coffee after an hour long chat.

Her window flies open, smacking against the brick wall of her flat, and Lily wonders for a moment if Peter Pan is outside her window listening in to her read.

Peter Pan.

Love.

Magic.

She doesn't believe in any of those things. Never has. And yet, she must be about to be proven wrong, for there sits James Potter outside her flat window,  _flying_  like Peter Pan except only on the handle of a broomstick, and somehow being completely made up of magic.

"Must you always prove me wrong?" she asks. "It really takes a hit at one's ego."

"I don't mean to," he says, grinning right back. "It's just rather fun - disproving your theories and all that."

The corners of her lips twitch. "Yes, well, is there a reason you're outside my window at three in the morning?"

"I was wondering if, perhaps, you'd like to go for a ride."

"A ride? On - on  _that?"_

"Yes, Evans."

"Why?"

"I've already incriminated myself by not erasing your memory, you see. And now I fear I'm quite taken with a life of crime."

"And you expect me to be your Bonnie?"

"My what?"

"Nothing," says Lily, rolling her eyes. "Non-magic reference that you wouldn't get."

James grins, not questioning her any further, and she thinks how different they must be. She who questions everything, he who seems to have little room for questions or doubts, and she wonders what that must be like. To step out on faith.

Perhaps a bit like stepping into air on nothing but the handle of a broomstick.

"Do you trust me?" he asks, as her eyes linger on the birch twigs that are seemingly vibrating with some sort of force.

"Where will you take me?" she asks instead of answering him. For she  _does_ trust him, and the thought is almost terrifying.

"Where do you want to go?"

She's got her bare feet planted on the windowsill, her hands bracing her on the wooden frame as the wind whips around her. Slowly, taking her time to remember this moment and every moment that follows afterwards, she lifts her eyes to find his own, finding them impossibly hazel. Impossibly bright.

"Second star to the right," she says. "Straight on 'til morning?"

* * *

_Morning, his place, burnt toast, Sunday…_

James isn't sure where  _Neverland_ is exactly, but s _econd star to the right and straight on 'til morning_ has led them back to his flat, and they're curled side by side on his bed as Lily reads to him from a book about a boy named Peter Pan.

Her hair is spilled across his pillow, and her face is close enough that he can see the scattering of freckles across her nose. He thinks that he could count them if he wasn't distracted by the way her lips are moving.

"If it wasn't for the fact that you're so very grown up, I'd suspect you really  _were_ Peter Pan" she says, closing the book and letting it fall between them. "Showing up at my window in the middle of the night and flying me away. What's a girl to think?"

"Hmm," he hums. "Perhaps, just this once at least, she shouldn't think."

Her eyes have the glaze of tiredness over them as she smiles at him, and James himself suspects he's in that peculiar state of being in between asleep and awake. Between reality and a dream.

"Lily Darling," she sighs, exhaling it like a prayer. "Do you ever think about the fact that we met by complete fate. That, perhaps, we would have  _never_ met if I hadn't been crossing the street that day."

"Never is an awfully long time," says James.

And it is.

Far too long.

And the sudden weight of a world without Lily Evans anchors on him. Clenching at his heart and making him feel as though he can't breathe properly.

And perhaps it's in the way that she looks at him in that next moment. As though she's got the beginnings of a girl in love blossoming in her eyes. Or perhaps it's in the way that the silence suddenly grows too loud between them, and the distance of her breath seems too far away and he needs it to sustain him.

Either way, it's a simple push as he rolls himself towards her, reaching out to her with a single hand to cup her face, and she meets him willingly in the middle. There's hardly enough time for a breath before the kiss that follows, and they're a tangle of brushing noses, parted lips, and each other's shallow breath.

And the first golden rays of early morning sunlight begin to peak through James' window, making everything look like honey and eclipsing with Lily's hair as she crawls over top of him, straddling him.

And he tugs her soft blue gown over top of her head as she raises her arms.

* * *

_You kissed on sidewalks, you fight and you talk…_

A month passes but time feels stopped for Lily.

As though she's in the moment where she's falling in a dream, but never hitting the ground. Never waking up.

She spends her days as she assumes Wendy Darling must have. An open book, an open window, and waiting for the boy with enough magic to make her fly to come bursting through, searching for his shadow.

Though there are days where  _she herself_ feels like his impossible shadow that he's been trying to catch rather than Wendy Darling.

And it's when they're standing across from each other on a sidewalk, their own shadows mirroring their tense stance, does she finally feel time speed up to this particular moment.

And she falls so hard she hasn't enough air in her lungs to cry out.

For there's a war brewing in the background of a world that she doesn't fully understand. A world that James is from, and that she can only touch the surface of through him.

"There  _can't_ be a war," she protests, "I would have  _heard_ about something like that. Even - even if they weren't sure what exactly it  _was,_  it surely would have been on the news. Especially -especially if... "

_Especially if they are trying to eradicate people like me,_ she thinks the words to herself for she can't seem to speak them aloud.

James shakes his head. "You don't understand."

"Then  _make me,"_ she pleads, because she can see it there in his eyes. The doubt that's forming.

"Voldemort...he's - he's not going to just  _let_ himself get caught. There are loads of things that have happened that muggles assume are just natural disasters or freak accidents, but they're  _not_. We're doing everything that we can to fight back -"

" _Fight back?_ Are  _you_ fighting in this war?"

He doesn't have to answer for Lily can see it in his eyes. Can tell that he is by the way he suddenly disappears for days at a time. Knows now the reasoning for him trying so very hard to stay away. And it's more than just the possibility of making her forget that he is fearful of, it's the having  _something_ to forget. Something that's so very worth remembering.

"I  _have_ to, Lily," he says, and Lily thinks she prefers silence. "If I don't then who will?"

_Someone else,_ Lily thinks selfishly,  _someone who it wouldn't hurt as much to lose._

But she knows she can't tell him that. That, as much as she wants to remain inside their little bubble a bit longer, it's bursting around them and he's got to go and she doesn't want him to leave with his eyes clouded in uncertainty.

She never wants him to look at her that way.

So instead she kisses him, and when she pulls away she glances at their shadows one last time. Their feet pointed so very close that they're nearly touching and she considers sewing them together.

And then he's gone, his shadow disappearing with the rest of him, and she's watches as her own mimics her as she collapses to the ground.

* * *

_One night, he wakes, strange look on his face, pauses and then says, you're my best friend, and you knew what it was, he is in love…_

The day that James Potter decided to walk home rather than apparate for no other reason than the simple need to clear his head after a talk with his old Headmaster about joining an organization meant for fighting in a war that he didn't start was the day that he realized  _why_ fighting was completely necessary.

For it was also the day that he met Lily Evans.

A girl that is logical, and brave. A girl that sees the world through the books that she carries. A girl who has stories to tell him about a boy and a girl who fly away together but never end up together, and he doesn't want that to be their fate.

For he  _can_ create a world in which she can fly away with him.  _Be_ with him.

Which is why he leaves her there on that sidewalk. Even though everything within him is screaming to stay with her. Even though he feels the throbbing through his veins when he pulls away from her,  _knowing_ what it means, but knowing that because of it - because of  _her -_ he has to go. He has to fight.

For when you meet your soulmate in the middle of a war, their love becomes a shield.

* * *

_You two are dancing in a snow globe, go round and round, and he keeps the picture of you in his office downtown, you understand now why they lost their minds and fought the wars, and why I've spent my whole life try to put it into words…_

The beginning of understanding happens for Lily at the end.

Or rather,  _its_ start.

For it's only when she's clutching at her still small stomach and staring down at the positive sign of a pregnancy test that she realizes  _why_ it is so important for James to be fighting in a war that neither one of them had a part in creating.

_Why_ it's so important for him to fly away and fight a villain who looks like Hook in her head.

And it's four weeks later when James still hasn't returned and she hears the beating of a heart that isn't hers, but one that is  _within_ her, that she realizes  _why_ it took her so long to understand what love is.

And that it isn't something that can be put into simple words.

Because it's in the magic that runs through James' veins, and in the beating heart of their unborn baby.

And she suspects that she will go the whole of her life being nearly mad with love from this point forward.


End file.
